Who's Who

Industry and academic circles continue to attempt to label brand community behaviours, borrowing analogies from subcultures such as religion (“evangelists”), slang (“geeks, mavens, haters”), science fiction (“fanboys”), and science (“alpha”). Although sometimes used as generic terms, upon examination, these and other such labels, can define the spectrum of brand attachment in a specific way—through narrative, metaphor, and cross-cultural labelling. Such labelling is happening already. This chapter parses the current meaning of one term from another into a folksonomy, or classification system developed by those steeped in the culture. This segmentation enables further research into specific fan types, along with industry recommendations for approaching each segment based on the behavioural characteristic inherent in both the historic and common usage of the word. It also moves toward the standardisation of these terms in industry and academic circles in order to further enable a lingua franca relating to this phenomenon.

The Interaction Between Brand Image, Brand Attachment and Brand Loyalty in Green Branding Context: The Mediating Role of Customer Engagement

As environmental problems are dramatically alarming the world, environmental issues have become the primary concerns of both consumers and companies. To please the environmental wants of consumers, many companies have to adopt green solutions today. Green brands are one of these solutions. Nevertheless, little has been known about the green brands. In this sense, this study attempts to explore the interaction between brand image (BIm), brand attachment (BAtt), customer engagement (CEn) and brand loyalty (BLo) within the scope of green brands as previously untapped context. In this study while brand image is determined as independent variable; customer engagement is specified as the mediator variable which mediates the link between brand image and brand attachment. Data were gathered from 428 participants through convenience sampling method. To examine the links between the variables in the suggested model, structural equation modelling was utilized. The results regarding the study bring out that brand image for green brands significantly influences customer engagement and brand attachment in a positive way; customer engagement has also a significant positive influence on brand attachment for green brands; and brand attachment for green brands significantly affects brand loyalty toward these brands in a positive way. In addition, partial mediating influence of customer engagement on the link between brand image for green brands and brand attachment was found significant. These findings also ensure applicable insights to practitioners, who are responsible for promotion of green brands, by emphasizing the importance of increasing brand image, customer engagement and customer attachment to generate loyal green customers.

Oxytocin increases perceived competence and social-emotional engagement with brands

Humans express loyalty to consumer brands much like they do in human relationships. The neuroactive chemical oxytocin is an important biological substrate of human attachment and this study tested whether consumer-brand relationships can be influenced by oxytocin administration. We present a mathematical model of brand attachment that generates empirically-testable hypotheses. The model is tested by administering synthetic oxytocin or placebo to male and female participants (N = 77) who received information about brands and had an opportunity to purchase branded products. We focused on two brand personality dimensions: warmth and competence. Oxytocin increased perceptions of brand competence but not brand warmth relative to placebo. We also found that participants were willing to pay more for branded products through its effect on brand competence. When writing about one’s favorite brands, oxytocin enhanced the use of positive emotional language as well as words related to family and friends. These findings provide preliminary evidence that consumers build relationships with brands using the biological mechanisms that evolved to form human attachments.

Effect of achievement-related gamification on brand attachment

PurposeThis research draws on self-determination theory and self-construal theory to investigate the effects of achievement-related gamification features on customers' brand attachment in online brand communities.Design/methodology/approachSurvey data (N = 523) were collected from customers of typical gamified online brand communities. The research model was examined with structural equation modeling using SmartPLS 3.2.FindingsAchievement-related gamification features positively affect customers' brand attachment via the intrinsic motives of autonomy, competence and relatedness, but not extrinsic motives. Relatedness motive exerts the strongest mediating effect between achievement-related gamification features and brand attachment, followed by competence and autonomy. Moreover, interdependent self-construal positively moderates the effects of achievement-related gamification features on intrinsic (autonomy, competence and relatedness) and extrinsic motives.Originality/valueTheoretically, this study contributes to the brand marketing literature by identifying gamification as a new antecedent for brand attachment. It also contributes to the gamification literature by demonstrating that achievement-related gamification features strengthen brand attachment via intrinsic motives but not extrinsic motives in the specific context of the online brand community. Meanwhile, the relatedness motive exerts the strongest mediating effect between achievement-related gamification features and brand attachment, followed by competence and autonomy. Moreover, this research provides the first empirical evidence that interdependent self-construal moderates the effects of achievement-related gamification features on intrinsic and extrinsic motives. Practically, managers can learn from the results that achievement-related gamification features should be designed to foster customers' intrinsic motives and brand attachment, especially those high in interdependent self-construal levels.

Hotel Choice of Muslim Consumers: Assessing the Unobserved Heterogeneity Among Gender

This paper aims to offer gendered insights on Malaysian Muslim tourist views of hotel choices. This study was designed to look at possible gender disparities in the perceived relevance of hotel attributes in developing emotional bonds with the hotel, that was enhanced by the brand credibility. The signaling theory were utilised to evaluate the relationships among the constructs. To validate the research model and hypotheses, the study used a partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique, and 474 Malaysian tourists were recruited to test the assumptions. The empirical results reveal that gender does not moderates the relationship between hotel attributes, brand credibility and brand attachment. Therefore, indicating that there were no differences observed between female and male Muslim tourists in their decision-making style. However, both male and female exhibited disparities in terms of strength on each construct. The findings of this study further provide a valuable implications and reference in terms of theoretical and practical perspective in the tourism destinations context, especially in Malaysia.